Baldisseri Reproves Chaput, Says Abuse Crisis Won’t Stop Synod Success

Catholic News Agency ^ | 10/1/18 | Hannah Brockhaus/CNA

[marshmallow]

Vatican City, Oct 1, 2018 / 11:23 am (CNA).- The secretary general of an upcoming synod of bishops said Monday he thinks the abuse scandal in the Catholic Church will not be a hindrance to the success of the meeting. He also criticized the recent decision of an American archbishop to publish a theologian’s critique of the synod’s working document.

“I do not think [the abuse crisis] is an impediment,” said Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, but that it is perhaps a “providential opportunity… to show to young people and everyone else what the Church is.”

He told journalists Oct. 1, that “the Church is not represented by some who make mistakes. The Church is not known only because of some who have fallen or caused scandal.”

Speaking just two days before the start of the assembly on young people, faith, and vocational discernment, Baldisseri said young people are intelligent and often speak openly and honestly and that he believes they understand “human frailty.”

The cardinal raised questions about Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia’s publication last month of an anonymous theological critique of the instrumentum laboris, or working document, of the synod.

The critique was published Sept. 21 at the website of the journal First Things. It was presented by Chaput, who withheld the author’s name, but referred to him as a “respected North American theologian.”

Shortly after its publication, Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago wrote to First Things, expressing concern about “the problematic nature of some forms of anonymity,” and asking why First Things had chosen to publish an unsigned critique, even one proffered by Chaput.

[dominic flandry]

I am sure the Sodomy Synod will be great success. (sarc)